Who should be the owner of all that currency found in the bathroom walls?

Ed, there was another thread on the "money in the walls"

 

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i think the homeowner has the right to 100% of it. she owns the house and everything in the house is hers. i wonder what they did with the cash. did they just deposit it at the bank! i heard they were really old.

 

http://www.cleveland.com/plaindealer/stories/index.ssf?/base/cuyahoga/1197452108280821.xml&coll=2

Here is the link to the original article that appeared in the Cleveland Plain Dealer. Surprisingly, there are some legal twists to this that may not make it a slam dunk for the homeowner. I suspect they'll settle out of court.

 

Since when is a poll the way to determine a legal question?

Unless there is a specific relevant statute in the jurisdiction, any court in a common law country (US, Canada, the United Kingdom, and a host of others) would hold that the homeowner bought the premises and its contents, and owns it all.

The "finders fee" offer was extremely generous, and not required by any law.

The "finders keepers law" is a figment of third grade schoolyard imaginations.

Added after additional consideration: Even if a "treasure trove" law applied, in a legal sense it's the homeowner who found the cash. The contractor's employee who actually first saw it was demolishing the wall as a sub-agent for the contractor, who was acting as an agent for the homeowner.

 

doubt the greed will pay off in the long run

 

I agree that this should be a poll so we can visualize the 100% of people who think the homeowner is entitled to all the money. Personally, I'm offended by the idea of offering this cretin of a contractor even a 10% finders fee.

Is a surgeon entitled to keep anything they find inside your body when they do an operation?

If you are having your car repaired is the mechanic entitled to keep your CD collection, your garage door opener and your iPod just because he finds them?

 

If I was her I would split it 50/50 with the contractor ( Though obviously this is not a law, I would just not feel right otherwise) . Without him I wouldnt have foudn it in the the first place. But if the family who it belongs to steps forward, it should go to them, I think.

 

If I recall, the Bonds baseball had to be sold because the IRS came knocking first wanting taxes on the supposed value of the ball. (A shaky premise which I think could have been won in the ball owners favor, but then he would have had to sell the ball to pay his legal fees, and then pay the taxes on the income anyway.)

 

Teoriginal owners sold the house and took what they wanted, leaving the $$$. The contractor deserve to get paid for the job he was hired to do, althought I would treat him to a generous tip, that is untill he went to court, now he gets nothing but a reputation as a greedy person and ungrateful.

 

I'm really not sure why the contractor isn't in prison. He burglarized the house and confessed to it. No lawsuit should be required, and the only unresolved issue is the length of his sentence.

 

Having just read the newspaper article he wants the money no doubt. He's an idiot for that -he should have taken the 10%.

As for prison time - is the money now in his possession because he took it home? No, he stumbled upon the money while doing work he was CONTRACTED to do.

Is greed a motivating factor? You bet!, but he stole nothing. He's in the process of trying to do so "legally" (if that makes any sense).


Prison time? Why would that even pop into your head? He was allowed into the home and apparently unsurpvised to do a job.


His greed is his only crime at this point and I'm betting he'll lose and I'm good with that.

 

This is where I disagree, he wasn't contracted to remove valuables from the house. The article also said he ripped into some walls unrelated to the job searching for more. Just because someone is in a house with permission doesn't give them the right to stuff their pockets before they leave.

 

I can agree with that point to an extent but what was he supposed to do when he discovered the first stash? Slap some new drywall over it? One could argue yes all day but who really would?

He should have stopped at that point and called the homeoner. She may have said "gut the room!" but that's conjecture on my part.

As for stuffing his pockets before he left? I don't recall him doing that and without a warrant we'll probably never know. I doubt he did as he called her.

He's not going to get prison time nor does he deserve it. He may get paid for the job that was contracted which after lawyer fees (and I believe he'll lose) will be a net loss.

Back to that should have taken the 10% offered.

 

So is there any way we can have this guys Addy and business info?

 

The money is the homeowners pure and simple

 

The New Owner is

The New Owner is.... Well... the New Owner of the house owns if a contractor find anything in the sink drain on the clore (money in the bathroom wall, safe or piggy bank) the owner of the found item is the home owner .
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